This document summarizes a lecture about connecting with the Linux community. It discusses finding answers to Linux questions by reading documentation, searching online, and asking on forums and mailing lists. It also encourages contributing back to the community by submitting bug reports, testing software, and helping other users on IRC channels. The lecture emphasizes respecting others and avoiding elitism when interacting with the community.

1. getting connected
Navya Linux Lecture Series
Day 1
Chintalagiri Shashank
chintal@iitk.ac.in

2. getting connected
 The Linux Community
 What you will be looking for
 Finding answers
 Asking for answers
 Becoming part of the process
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

3. the linux community
 How big is it?
 How is it different from the windows
‘community’?
 How do I use the community to my
advantage?
 How do I contribute to the community?
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

4. linux @ IITK
 How big is the linux community here?
 Good places to meet the rest of the
community
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

5. what you will be looking for
 General help to get started
 Software to perform specific tasks
 Solutions to problems during installation of
various software
 Solutions to hardware-specific problems
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

6. finding answers
 Read the documentation
that came with it.
 Google is your friend
 www.google.com
 Distro-specific forums and
wikis
 http://www.ubuntuforums.org
 http://wiki.ubuntu.com
 Many, many more
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

7. how can Navya help?
 The Navya Wiki, which you can find over at
http://navya.junta.iitk.ac.in, will probably grow to be
a good place to find solutions, especially to
campus specific problems.
 The Navya Forums, which can also be found on
the same website, will soon be opened to general
linux discussion as well. Currently, it only has
some of the MEMP related discussions.
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

8. asking for answers
 Forums
 Forums are a good place to ask questions. In many
major forums, such as the ubuntu and gentoo forums,
you are likely to get a reply – either a solution or a
pointer to where it might be found.
 A news News Server has been installed on the campus
and is functioning. The CC requests people to start using
it for testing purpose, while narad will keep running till
this Semester end.
Address of news News Server:
http://newshost.iitk.ac.in/newsgroup
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

9. asking for answers
 Mailing lists
 Most projects have mailing lists that you can subscribe
to.
 They can help keep track of developments in the projects
that interest you.
 More often than not, the developers keep an eye – and
participate in the discussions on mailing lists.
 Keep in mind of the volume of mail that the list
generates.
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

10. asking for answers
 IRC
 Communicate in real time with a large number of people.
 Have someone help you troubleshoot your problem.
 How?
 You will need an IRC client, such as xchat on linux, mIRC on
windows, or gaim (works on both)
 Use the client to connect to the IRC server.
 Use the IRC command “/join #ChannelName” to join (or create
a channel if it is not present already)
 “/list” lists all the open channels
 Where?
 Freenode is a good international network to get help for most
open-source projects. (irc.freenode.net, port 6667)
 #ubuntu, #ubuntu-in, #linux-india
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

11. can Navya help here?
 We already spoke of the Navya forums.
 Navya has an IRC server running
 on navya.junta.iitk.ac.in , port 6667.
 you can usually find us there at #navya
 for the duration of these lectures, we will also be
available at #lectures.
 Navya IRC web interface – chat from your browser
 You don’t need an IRC client to connect to the Navya
IRC network.
 http://navya.junta.iitk.ac.in/irc
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

12. IMPORTANT
 lesson #1 : "be thick skinned"
 Does NOT mean you rush into some channel and
ask "Do you guys know a guy called Torvalds"
 lesson #2: you don't prove yourself an
"individual/rebel" by dismissing/insulting
people
 lesson #3, elitism is different from the elite
- the former is bad, the latter is good
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

13. IMPORTANT
The bottom line is, in any form of
communication, make sure you respect
the other people involved – especially if
you expect them to help you.
And don’t try to start flame wars.
Navya Linux Lecture Series

14. becoming part of the process
 How you can contribute :
 Submit bug reports when something is broken
 Launchpad
 Help test the software on your hardware.
 Ubuntu Hardware Compatibility Chart on the Wiki
 Hang around the IRC channels when you have
nothing better to do and help out the next guy.
You’ll almost always learn something new each
time.
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series

15. Thank You
and welcome to the community
chintal@iitk.ac.in Navya Linux Lecture Series